The NBA’s 24-second shot clock was invented in 1954 by Syracuse Nationals owner Danny Biasone, who wanted to force teams to pick up the pace of games. Why 24 seconds?

“I looked at the box scores from the games I enjoyed, games where they didn’t screw around and stall,” Biasone explained. “I noticed each team took about 60 shots. That meant 120 shots per game. So I took 48 minutes (2,880 seconds) and divided that by 120 shots. The result was 24 seconds per shot.”